Mass deportations. Political revenge. Project 2025. Unfathomable corruption. An all-out assault on democracy. Everything we care about is in danger, and Common Dreams is fighting back by exposing their lies and lifting up the voices of those working to stop Trump and his allies.
We must start 2026 strong. Our Year-End Campaign is our most important fundraiser, and every gift helps keep our independent, fearless journalism alive. Will you stand with Common Dreams and make a year-end donation today?
It's a nightmare.
We must start 2026 strong. Our Year-End Campaign is our most important fundraiser, and every gift helps keep our independent, fearless journalism alive. Will you stand with Common Dreams and make a year-end donation today?
NWLC to Launch First National Legal Network to Battle Sex Discrimination
Attorneys from across the country will help fill void left by Trump’s rollback of women’s rights.
WASHINGTON
In response to extensive and unprecedented threats to women's rights, the National Women's Law Center (NWLC) announced today that it is launching the first national legal network to combat sex discrimination faced by women and girls. The Legal Network for Gender Equity has initially recruited 75 attorneys from across the country who stand ready to represent women and girls experiencing sex discrimination on the job, at school, and in the health care system. The Center is assembling the infrastructure for the network to become fully operational in the next several months and will continue to expand its network--with the goal of attorneys participating in every state.
"I'm thrilled to lead an initiative to increase the resources available to aggressively take on legal challenges and defend women's rights--especially at this moment when civil rights enforcement and protections are at grave risk," said Fatima Goss Graves, NWLC President and CEO. "We've seen a surge of gender-based hostility and harassment across the nation. Escalating federal rollbacks to critical protections in education, the workplace, and health care--which disproportionately threaten low-income women and women of color--have inspired many lawyers to get involved in the legal network and fight for the rights of women and girls. And, as the Trump administration weakens its enforcement of laws protecting against sex discrimination, NWLC will be heading to court, challenging these rollbacks and increasing the number of cases we take on ourselves."
The first case arising out of Center intake and taken up by a law firm participating in the Legal Network for Gender Equity is that of Kassandra Lawrence, a veteran law enforcement officer in Stafford, Virginia, who faced discrimination on the job during two pregnancies and after she returned to work following the birth of her children. Lawrence's superiors refused her requests for work accommodations during her pregnancies, required her to take unpaid leave even though she had additional paid leave time in reserve, and would not allow her colleagues to donate their paid sick leave to her when she required surgery after her second pregnancy. Other employees were routinely given work accommodations and allowed to receive donated paid sick leave. Lawrence lost wages, employment benefits, and experienced emotional distress as a result of the discrimination. The Spiggle Law Firm, which specializes in pregnancy discrimination cases, recently filed a lawsuit on Lawrence's behalf against the Stafford County Sheriff's office. Tom Spiggle and Phillis Rambsy, partners at the Spiggle Law Firm, will lead the representation of Lawrence.
The administration's assaults on the rights of women and girls include: the Department of Health and Human Services' far-reaching new rules that roll back the Affordable Care Act's birth control benefit by extending exemptions that allow employers who claim religious or moral objections to refuse to provide birth control coverage to their employees; the Department of Education's recent revoking of the 2011 Title IX sexual assault guidance, which will discourage students from reporting sexual assault, create uncertainty for schools on how to follow the law, and make campuses less safe; the Office of Management and Budget's decision to halt the EEO-1 equal pay data collection, which required large companies to confidentially report to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission information about what they pay their employees by job category, sex, race, and ethnicity; the Department of Justice's recent announcement that LGBT individuals should be excluded from federal sex discrimination protections--counter to prevailing legal trends; and the Department of Labor's proposal to eliminate the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, which enforces the equal opportunity laws that apply to federal contractors. These efforts to weaken enforcement of women's rights to be free from discrimination make the availability of attorneys willing to take these cases on more important than ever.
The Center will serve as the Network's hub and first line of contact for women and girls sharing their personal experiences of discrimination and seeking legal information and assistance. The Center will oversee the intake process, provide women and girls legal resources and names of network attorneys who have expressed willingness to take on cases, track trends in complaints over time, and serve as co-counsel in selected cases. It will also provide resources on key legal developments regarding sex discrimination and harassment to Network attorneys and other interested parties, expanding the capacity of the private bar to undertake this work.
Debra Katz, a member of NWLC's Legal Network for Gender Equity, expert on sex discrimination law, and partner in Katz, Marshall & Banks, hailed the initiative, stating, "NWLC's leadership has demonstrated to at least two generations of women attorneys, like myself, how to be fierce legal advocates. As members of the Network, my firm and dozens of others in the private bar will help ensure that institutions that seek to deprive us of our basic legal and constitutional rights to equal pay, gender equality, and reproductive rights are held accountable."
The Center has worked for more than 40 years to protect and promote equality and opportunity for women and families. We champion policies and laws that help women and girls achieve their potential at every stage of their lives -- at school, at work, at home, and in retirement. Our staff are committed advocates who take on the toughest challenges, especially for the most vulnerable women.
SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
A Republican congressman on Wednesday pushed back against President Donald Trump's push for war with Venezuela.
Speaking on the floor of the House of Representatives, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) demanded that Trump not take any military action against Venezuela without approval from the US Congress.
"The framers [of the US Constitution] understood a simple truth: To the extent that war-making powers devolves to one person, liberty dissolves," he said. "If the president believes that military action against Venezuela is justified and needed, he should make the case, and Congress should vote before American lives and treasure are spent on regime change in South America."
Massie then made clear that he wasn't simply making a procedural case against the president's actions, but a substantive case against going to war with Venezuela. In particular, the Kentucky congressman pointed to past US failures in regime-change wars such as Iraq and Libya to warn against making a similar case in South America.
"Previous presidents told us to go to war over WMDs that did not exist," he said, referring to weapons of mass destruction. "Now it's the same playbook. Except we're told that drugs are the WMDs. If it were about drugs, we'd bomb Mexico or China or Colombia."
Massie also argued that, if Trump were really concerned about the flow of illicit drugs into the US, he wouldn't have pardoned Juan Orlando Hernández, the former president of Honduras who had been convicted in 2024 of conspiring to smuggle 400 tons of cocaine into the US.
"This is about oil and regime change," Massie said.
Massie: Previous presidents told us to go to war over WMDs that did not exist. Now it's the same playbook. Except we're told that drugs are the WMDs. If it were about drugs, we'd bomb Mexico or China or Colombia. And the president would not have pardoned Juan Orlando Hernandez.… pic.twitter.com/5h296rYnPJ — Acyn (@Acyn) December 17, 2025
Massie's points about the administration's rationale for war with Venezuela were echoed by Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who also delivered a speech in the US House Wednesday denouncing the rush for military action.
"This is not about drugs, this is about regime change," she said. "And we also have the White House chief of staff [Susie Wiles] saying that this is about regime change. It has nothing to do with drugs."
Like Massie, Omar also emphasized the role for Congress set out by the US Constitution when it comes to declarations of war.
"Only Congress has the power to declare war," she said. "The Trump administration's military escalation in the Caribbean is not only reckless, it is blatantly illegal. We cannot allow this kind of dangerous overreach to go unchecked."
Trump's illegal military strikes in Venezuela aren't about drugs. They are about regime change.
But we must be clear - only Congress has the authority to declare war. Not the president.
Massie and Omar delivered their speeches during a debate over two resolutions aimed at limiting Trump's ability to wage war against Venezuela.
The first resolution demands Trump "remove United States armed forces from hostilities with any presidentially designated terrorist organization in the Western Hemisphere, unless authorized by a declaration of war or a specific congressional authorization for use of military force."
The second resolution more explicitly "directs the president to remove the use of United States armed forces from hostilities within or against Venezuela, unless explicitly authorized by a declaration of war or specific statutory authorization for use of military force."
Trump and his administration in recent weeks have been acting with increasing aggression against Venezuela, starting with the bombing of purported drug trafficking boats off the country's coast, and escalating earlier this month to seizing an oil tanker that had docked at one of its ports.
On Tuesday night, Trump announced a “total and complete blockade” of all “sanctioned oil tankers” seeking to enter and leave the country.
“Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. “It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before."
While talking with reporters on Wednesday, Trump upped the ante further and said that the US wanted to take Venezuela's oil supply.
"Getting land, oil rights, whatever we had—they took it away because we had a president that maybe wasn't watching," Trump said. "But they're not gonna do that. We want it back. They took our oil rights. We had a lot of oil there. They threw our companies out. And we want it back."
Sen. Ron Wyden said the bill "increases military spending by tens of billions of dollars and fails to include guardrails against Donald Trump and Hegseth’s authoritarian abuses."
A majority of Democratic senators joined Republicans on Wednesday to pass the largest military spending bill in US history, handing President Donald Trump the bulk of his demands, even as he enacts steep cuts across nearly every other sector of the federal budget.
The more than $900 billion National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) passed by a vote of 77-20, with 27 Democrats, as well as the independent Sen. Angus King (Maine), in support. Just three members of the Republican majority voted against the bill, along with 16 Democrats and independent Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.).
Among many other items on Trump's wish list, the bill provides funds for weapons meant to counter China, full funding for Trump's National Guard deployments to support the US immigration agents, and more funds for what are described as "counternarcotics operations."
It also removes a measure that would have restored collective bargaining rights that Trump stripped earlier this year from Pentagon employees, permanently ends Defense Department initiatives to curb climate change, and excludes a measure that would mandate healthcare coverage for in vitro fertilization.
Combined with $156 billion in the GOP's One Big Beautiful Bill Act this July, the package passed by the Senate pushesmilitary spending for fiscal year 2026 into the trillions—a new record in absolute terms and a relative level unseen since World War II.
The bill will head to Trump's desk just a day after he announced a “total and complete blockade" on Venezuelan oil tankers, a major escalation described by Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) as "unquestionably an act of war."
The bill contains a measure demanding that the Pentagon release the unedited video of a September 2 "double-tap" strike on a boat in the Caribbean that members of both parties have suggested may violate international law.
On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubiodeclined another congressional request to release the video. The defense bill ramps up the pressure for transparency, mandating a 25% cut to Hegseth's travel budget if the administration does not comply.
Senate Democrats have previously voted in support of war powers resolutions to require congressional approval for Trump's boat strikes and for further military action against Venezuela. These measures have repeatedly fallen just short in the Republican-controlled Senate.
But Stephen Semmler, a co-founder of the Security Policy Reform Institute, argued that "if the Senate truly cared about Trump seeking congressional approval before starting a war with Venezuela, it wouldn't have passed a bill authorizing $901 billion in military spending."
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who voted no on the defense spending bill, said, "I cannot support a bill that increases military spending by tens of billions of dollars and fails to include guardrails against Donald Trump and Hegseth’s authoritarian abuses."
“Donald Trump has repeatedly used the military to occupy major US cities, including Portland—endangering our service members, disrupting our economy, and eroding trust in our communities," Wyden continued. “He has also shown that he will use the Department of Defense to conduct deadly military operations without congressional authorization to intimidate political opponents and immigrants through the military, to purge senior military leaders without cause, to funnel billions of dollars in contracts to his personal supporters, and to waste billions of taxpayer dollars."
The defense spending bill passed the US House last week, with support from 115 Democrats. This was despite opposition from the Congressional Progressive Caucus, whose deputy chair, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), said it was "enabling unchecked executive war powers."
The House is expected to vote Wednesday evening on a pair of war powers resolutions. One, introduced by Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), would block Trump's extrajudicial airstrikes on boats in the Caribbean. Another bipartisan resolution would require Trump to receive congressional approval before taking direct military action, including land strikes, against Venezuela.
"After 20 years of continuous reporting, the Report Card stands as a chronicle of change and a caution for what the future will bring," report contributors said.
The Arctic just experienced its warmest air temperatures on record between October 2024 and September 2025 as the climate crisis dramatically alters the region, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found in its 20th Arctic Report Card.
The annual report, released Tuesday, also notes the Arctic's lowest maximum sea-ice extent and its wettest year on record. The past 10 years have been the warmest recorded in a region that is heating at two to four times the global average.
"After 20 years of continuous reporting, the Report Card stands as a chronicle of change and a caution for what the future will bring," report editors Matthew Langdon Druckenmiller, Rick Thoman, and Twila A. Moon wrote in the executive summary. "Transformations over the next 20 years will reshape Arctic environments and ecosystems, impact the well-being of Arctic residents, and influence the trajectory of the global climate system itself, which we all depend on."
Arctic warming is not confined to the spring and summer months, but marks a full-year transformation, with fall 2024 being the warmest Arctic fall on record and winter 2025 the second-warmest winter. While snow levels do remain high in the winter months, they consistently drop by June, with snow cover during that month now about half of 1960s levels. Precipitation in the winter months is also not limited to snow.
"We can point to the Arctic as a far away place but the changes there affect the rest of the world.”
At sea, ice extent is also shrinking in the winter, with March 2025 seeing the lowest maximum sea-ice extent in nearly 50 years of satellite data. The oldest, thickest ice has shrunk by over 95% since the 1980s, and its domain has constricted to areas north of Greenland and the Canadian archipelago.
“There’s been a steady decline in sea ice and unfortunately we are seeing rain now even in winter,” Druckenmiller told the Guardian. “We are seeing changes in the heart of winter, when we expect the Arctic to be cold. The whole concept of winter is being redefined in the Arctic.”
Warming temperatures are also driving changes in ecosystems, with more southern species and conditions shifting northward both on land and at sea. On land, this happens via the "greening" of the tundra and the spread of boreal species into the Arctic. At sea, warmer, saltier water is shifting north, driving the "Atlantification" of the Arctic, which exacerbates ice melt and threatens to destabilize ocean circulation patterns.
Changes are also occurring on the Pacific side of the Arctic Ocean, with Arctic species declining by two-thirds in the northern Bering Sea and one-half in the Chukchi Sea.
“We are no longer just documenting warming—we are witnessing an entire marine ecosystem transform within a single generation,” Hannah-Marie Ladd, director of the Indigenous Sentinels Network on the Aleut community of Saint Paul Island, said at a conference unveiling the report.
Ocean warming, the melting of glaciers, and melting permafrost are increasing weather hazards and other dangers for Arctic communities. For example, warm ocean temperatures fueled ex-Typhoon Halong in October 2025, which forced over 1,500 people to evacuate from Alaska's southwestern coast and nearly destroyed two villages.
Glacier melt has increased the risk of sudden flooding and landslides, while the melting of permafrost is leading to the phenomenon of "rusting rivers," as oxidized iron from melting permafrost enters the water and degrades water quality.
These impacts aren't limited to the Arctic. The Greenland ice sheet, for example, lost 129 billion tons of sea ice, which contributes to global sea-level rise.
“We are seeing cascading impacts from a warming Arctic,” Climate Central scientist Zack Labe told the Guardian. “Coastal cities aren’t ready for the rising sea levels, we have completely changed the fisheries in the Arctic, which leads to rising food bills for seafood. We can point to the Arctic as a far away place but the changes there affect the rest of the world.”
Outside researchers noted that the administration did not seem to have significantly altered the content of the 2025 Arctic Report Card.
“I honestly did not see much of a tone shift in comparison to previous Arctic report cards in years past, which was great to see,” Climate Centralmedia director Tom Di Liberto toldNBC News. “The implications of their findings are the same as past Arctic report cards. The Arctic is the canary in the coal mine.”
"The Trump administration’s cuts to budgets, staffing, and resources for science are already affecting data and research related to the Arctic."
Druckenmiller also told reporters that the team “did not receive any political interference with our results.”
However, the 2024 Arctic Report Cardurged a "global reductions of fossil fuel pollution," in its subhead, an exhortation missing from the 2025 version.
The 2025 report did refer to the impacts of federal funding cuts, discussing "vulnerabilities and risks facing nationally and internationally coordinated observing programs, especially amid risks of diminishing US investments in climate and environmental observations," as Druckenmiller, Thoman, and Moon wrote.
"The Trump administration’s cuts to budgets, staffing, and resources for science are already affecting data and research related to the Arctic," the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) posted on social media in response to the release.
However, even if the report did not highlight the causes of the climate emergency, it's ultimate message was unmistakable, UCS said: "It’s clear that fossil fueled climate change is having an alarming effect on the vital signs of this unique, crucial region of the world."
